The use of epoxy/carbon fiber composite material is steadily increasing in the air framer and aircraft engine industries. The labor intensity of applying fiber composite materials in the assembly of air frames and aircraft engines is well known, and it would be desirable to be able to automate some of the necessary functions. A key step in the automating process is cutting the composite material. The challenge is to cut the material, in particular, ribbon, to any required length, while not creating any potential defects at the cut edge. Potential defects at the cut edge can cause potential problems during any automated lamination procedure for fabricating a part, or with the functionality of the resulting part or component.
Since mechanical cutting hardware wears with use, there will be potential maintenance and up-time problems in any automated system. When cutting composite ribbon with mechanical hardware, there is a probable inherent cut length limit that is obtainable. This is a problem when a part is being built up from different composite ribbon cut lengths. Presently, mechanical cutting operations used for epoxy/carbon fiber composite include the use of shears, knives, blades, scissors and diamond-based tools. A large percentage of all composite cutting is performed manually. Some of these manual operations are being evaluated for potential integration into proposed automated systems. Although attempts have been made to use CO.sub.2 lasers, water jets, and ultrasonics to cut composite material, these techniques are difficult to integrate into the composite ribbon laminating part of a fabricating machine.
It would be desirable then to have a method for cutting epoxy/carbon fiber composite. It would further be desirable to have such a method wherein the cutting can be accomplished at a high rate without causing any mechanical or heat related defects at the cut edge. It would be desirable to provide such a cutting means which is integrable in an automated environment.